by Joachim Fischer, Phnom Pen

Senior officials from China, Japan and South Korea agreed to develop and support Asean tourism, in order to boost visitor numbers. Tith Chantha, general director of Cambodia´s Ministry of Tourism after zhe meeting:” All the Asean countries appreciate China, Japan and Korea ( known as ASEAN + 3) for their support.”

“ We want ASEAN +3 countries continue to promote tourism in the region and facilitate tourists in order to attract more and more visitor to come to ASEAN countries.This is our goal”, he said.  He explained that members of the ten-nation bloc wanted the three additional countries to promote human resources development within tourism – through training courses, seminars, workshops – as well as help in facilitating visits from information technology experts. “ We also asked India and Russia to continue to promote and cooperate to push tourists to come to the ASEAN region”,

In 2010, there are more than 70 million visitors to the AEAN members, of which 10 millions  visitors come from ASEAN +3 countries, Tith Chantha said. A representative from China, Japan and Korea said they would help “promote the region as a unique tourism destination”.

A strategy for tourism development in ASEAN + 3 from 2011 to 2015 was tabled during the meeting and will be discussed during a top-level meeting between ministers of tourism from the bloc this week.

This week at ATF Asean Tourism Forum, in Phnom Penh, Cambodia 14 Minister of Tourism and  14 Director General of the  National Tourism Authorities  are leading their delegation and participate in this very important event  for the Asian Tourism. This ATF Meeting together with the TRAVEX  is organized every January in an other ASEAN Country, last year in Brunei, this year in Cambodia and next year 2012 it will be in Indonesia.